THE GOOD WORD
Aug 23, 2021 - Week 36
Volume 7S-15| Pages 2
Afghanistan National Resistance Front to
prove its mettle, pitted against Taliban
Aug 23, amid the
imminent face off
between the National
Resistance Front (NRF)
and the Taliban,
Tajikistan flew in a
helicopter with military
equipment, weapons
and supplies for the
NRF to the Panjshir
valley.
The NRF is led by the 32
year old, politician and
military leader Ahmad
Massoud in
coordination with the
former vice president of
Afghanistan Amrullah
Saleh. Saleh declared a
week ago that he is the
president of the
country per its
constitution after ex-
president Ashraf Ghani
fled to UAE. Ex-Afghan
defence minister
Bismillah Mohammadi,
the Afghan embassy in
Tajikistan and its
ambassador
Mohammad Aghbar
along with Massoud
endorse Saleh’s claim.
The NRF operates from
Panjshir valley, about
150 km north of Kabul,
surrounded by tall
mountains, that rise
steeply, and narrow
passes at the either
ends of the Panjshir
river. The mountains
make it a formidable
base, easy to defend
Bharat First
authorities have been
asked to hand over all
case records to the CBI.
The CBI and SIT will
submit a status report
to the HC in six weeks.
The court was hearing
pleas mainly against
Trinamool Congress
(TMC) cadres for
unleashing violence on
BJP workers and
supporters after
winning state polls. The
state police was
accused of deliberate
inaction and complicity.
In over 60% of the cases
Aug 18, in a first for India,
Benaras Hindu University
(BHU), Uttar Pradesh, has
introduced a degree
course on Hinduism.
The course will delve into
the principles and
philosophy of Hinduism.
It will cover the teachings
of Swami Vivekananda.
The Sanskrit department
will teach the Vedas,
scriptures and mantras.
Students will also be
taught science, art,
architecture, the nature
of warfare and commerce
prevalent during the
reigns of great emperors.
It will be a 2 year course
with 40 seats and forms
will be accepted till Sep 7.
Foreign students can also
apply. Degree courses on
faiths like Islam and
Christianity were already
being taught in Indian
universities but not
Hinduism, the BHU vice-
chancellor said.
At: NewsBharati Image: PahalDesign
Visit IndiaWiki.org
Aug 20, PM Modi laid a
foundation stone for four
projects to enhance the
surroundings of the
Somnath temple. A 1.5
km sea side promenade
has been developed with
landscaped gardens. A
temple history exhibition
centre and a new Parvati
temple are to be
constructed and the
existing temple will be
renovated. All four will
cost a little over ₹80
crores.
At the ceremony PM
Modi said faith can’t be
crushed with terror. The
riches of Somnath were
plundered repeatedly.
Mohammad Ghazni, one
of the earlier raiders
looted the temple gold in
1025 AD. He hailed from
Ghazni in Afghanistan.
Ironically that land is
beset by turmoil and ruin
today while Somnath is
set to become even more
resplendent. At: OpIndia,
Newstracklive, Jagran
state’s approval prior
to filing it. Section 17A
of Prevention of
Corruption Act
mandates such a state
approval to protect a
public servant from
frivolous harassment.
The bench rejected this
argument. It explained
when an enquiry is
ordered by the HC,
there already is a
safeguard against
harassment. A court
orders a preliminary
enquiry first for
persons holding high
office to ensure the
complaint is not
frivolous. Allegations
against Deshmukh
were of a nature that
could have shaken the
foundation of the
police force and
citizenry as a whole. A
state or central
government
cannot prevent
investigation of its
officers by CBI if it is
ordered by a top court
as that would defeat
the court’s directions.
The bench then
dismissed the appeal.
At: Republic, TimesNow
Aug 18, in a major set
back for the Mamata
Banerjee government, a
five judge bench of the
Calcutta High Court (HC)
ordered a CBI probe into
the murder, rape and
other atrocities
unleashed in Bengal after
the assembly election
results were announced
in May. A Special
Investigation Team (SIT)
with IPS officers has also
been formed which will
be monitored by a
retired Supreme Court
judge. State and central
Aug 19, the Defence
Research and
Development
Organisation (DRDO) has
developed an advanced
chaff defense solution to
enhance stealth
capabilities of air force
fighter jets and obfuscate
detection by enemy
radars. Chaff material and
cartridges are used in an
aircraft to spray out a
cloud of small, thin pieces
of aluminum, glass fibre
or plastic. Chaff appears
as a cluster of primary
targets on the radar and
swamp it with false
positives. It can disorient
detection and deflect
missiles. Only a small
quantity is needed to act
as a decoy. Indian Air
Force has commenced
induction of the new
technology and industrial
production has started.
More at: PIB
for a force occupying
the valley. The NRF has
been rallying anti-
Taliban soldiers of the
now disbanded Afghan
National Army and
civilian fighters, at
Panjshir. The valley
houses Afghanistan’
largest population of
Tajik ethnicity, of nearly
100,000. Saleh and
Massoud are also
Tajiks.
The NRF claims support
of military leaders
Abdul Dostum and Atta
Muhammad Nur.
Dostum's group had
reportedly retreated
into Uzbekistan with
10,000 soldiers. Pg 2
Aug 21, Kalyan Singh, 89,
the 2 time BJP chief
minister (CM) of Uttar
Pradesh (UP), 1991 to
1992 and 1997-1999,
passed away. Prime
minister Modi and CM
Adityanath paid him rich
tributes. Singh’s tenure
had mainstreamed good
governance, unity and
Hindutva. UP will observe
a 3 day state mourning.
As UP CM, he shot to
fame when he prevented
the police from opening
fire at crowds of kar
sevaks during the Babari
mosque demolition.
Thereafter, he stepped
down as CM shouldering
full responsibility and
maintained he was willing
to forsake power any
number of times for
Bhagwan Ram.
SwarajyaMag, Image-MyNationNews
the police did not file an
FIR. The state was
ordered to grant victims
compensation
immediately. The HC
dismissed the state’s
allegations of bias
against the National
Human Rights
Commission which the
court had directed to
probe the violence
earlier. The CBI has
formed four teams with
about seven members
each for the probe and
called for police
records. OpIndia, Republic,
Image-Anandbazar
Aug 18, the Supreme
Court dismissed a plea
by the former
Maharashtra home
minister, Anil
Deshmukh, challenging
the Bombay High
Court’s (HC) order to
allow CBI to file an FIR
to probe corruption
charges against him.
On July 22, the Bombay
HC had refused to
quash an FIR that CBI
had registered against
Deshmukh. The FIR
sought to probe charges
of illegal extortion
against Deshmukh while
he was the state home
minister, his role in the
reinstatement of API
Sachin Vaze, who is now
in jail for planting a car
with gelatin sticks in
front of industrialist
Mukesh Ambani’s
residence and
corruption in police
transfers. CBI had
registered an FIR after it
conducted a preliminary
enquiry on the HC’s
direction.
The minister’s counsel
argued that the FIR was
invalid as the CBI had
failed to secure the
Gayatri Pratipada image courtesy Samarth.Community; International Dog Day image courtesy SaveOurGreen
US and IMF freeze
Afghan national
reserves and loan
Calcutta HC orders CBI to probe West
Bengal post poll violence, SIT to be formed
Modi launches key
enhancements at
Somanath temple
Kalyan Singh, ex-
Uttar Pradesh CM
passes away
Dabur.com
SC junks ex-Maharashtra home
minister Deshmukh’s plea
DRDO develops
advanced chaff
defense for aircrafts
In a first, BHU to
start degree course
on Hinduism
Aug 17, in the wake of
radical Taliban terrorists
taking over Afghanistan,
the Yogi Adityanath
government has started
the set up of a dozen
Anti-Terrorism Squads
(ATS) and commando
training centres in
sensitive districts of UP.
The ATS will be
provided state-of-the-
art equipment and an
increased number of
Yogi to set up anti-terrorism squad
in Deoband and sensitive areas
Aug 19, the Taliban
which is attempting to
consolidate its control
on Afghanistan will not
be able to access the
country’s national
reserve. Ajmal Ahmady,
the governor of the
country’s central bank
(DAB) tweeted that the
Taliban are asking about
the location of the
reserve. Of the $9
billion reserves, $7
billion are with the US
Federal Reserve. On
Wednesday, the US
Federal Reserve blocked
the Taliban’s access to
DAB’s assets.
The IMF was scheduled
to provide a loan
tranche of $340 million
this month, which it
suspended on Thursday
citing lack of clarity on
the government. Earlier
Afghanistan received
physical cash in
shipments every few
weeks. Now there is no
balance left and cash
shipments have
stopped.MSN
Aug 18, the Indian and
Vietnam navies
conducted a bilateral
maritime exercise in the
South China Sea. India
deployed its latest
Rajput class destroyer
with guided missiles, INS
Ranjvijay and a lead
missile corvette INS
Kora. Vietnam fielded
its frigate VPNS Ly Thai
To.
This is a continuation of
an ongoing deployment
of Indian navy ships in
the South China Sea
where India is asserting
a need for an open and
rule based Indo-Pacific
region. India has
periodically held joint
exercises with Vietnam
to strengthen defence
ties. Last year, passage
manoeuvers tested
‘war’ readiness. This
time surface warfare
exercises, weapon firing
drills and helicopter
operations were
executed.
More at: PIB, Republic
India-Vietnam hold
naval exercise in
South China Sea
employees and officers.
Recently the state
acquired 20,000 sqm of
land in Deoband, West
UP. Prominent Taliban
leaders have studied at
Deoband seminaries.
Other districts where ATS
will be located include
Meerut, Aligarh,
Bahraich, Noida,
Azamgarh Kanpur,
Sonbhadra and Mirzapur.
NewIndianExpress, TFIPost
Ananda Meditation Retreat
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Aug 23, 2021 | Week 36 | Volume 7S-15
Bharat First
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PAGE 2 THE GOOD WORD
What’s 50 Times More Dangerous Than Afghanistan?
America,” Gul says to a
fawning TV studio
audience. “Then there
will be another
sentence. The ISI, with
the help of America,
defeated America.”
You can understand
why Taliban fans want
to gloat. Between 2002
and 2018, the U.S.
government gave
Pakistan more than $33
billion in assistance,
including about $14.6
billion in so-called
Coalition Support Funds
paid by the Pentagon to
the Pakistani military. (
Donald Trump ended
nearly all military
assistance and also
slashed nonmilitary aid
from its peak in the
Obama years.) During
the same period,
Pakistan ensured the
failure of America’s
Afghanistan project by
surreptitiously
sheltering, arming and
training the Taliban.
“We found ourselves
in an incredibly bizarre
situation, where you
are paying the country
that created your
enemy so that it will let
you keep fighting that
enemy,” says Sarah
Chayes, a former
adviser to the chairman
of the Joint Chiefs of
Staff, in a phone
interview. “If you
wanted to win the war,
you had to crack down
on Pakistan. If you
wanted to conduct
operations [in
Afghanistan] you had to
mollify Pakistan.”
For Pakistan’s generals,
winning the “double
game”—ostensibly
aiding America while
simultaneously
abetting its enemies—
required finesse. At
times, it appeared as
though the jig was up,
especially in 2011
when U.S. Navy SEALs
killed Osama bin Laden
in a safe house next to
Pakistan’s premier
military academy. But
successive
administrations—
Republican and
Democratic—refused
to take measures that
could have forced
Pakistan to rethink its
support for the
Taliban.
Ideas such as forcibly
denuclearizing
Pakistan, imposing
sanctions on army
officers, curbing the
travel and education in
the West of ISI
operatives and their
families, scrapping
Pakistan’s farcical
designation as a “major
non-NATO ally,” and
declaring it a state
sponsor of terrorism
never made it beyond
think tank reports and
newspaper punditry.
Washington always
blinked, fearing
instability in a nuclear-
armed nation of more
than 200 million
people.
“Pakistan is a country-
sized suicide bomber,”
Ms. Chayes says. “The
message Islamabad
sends is that if you get
too close to us we’re
going to blow
ourselves up.”
The world will likely get
that instability anyway.
At least for now, the
Taliban’s victory fulfills
the Pakistani army’s
decades-old quest to
gain “strategic depth”
by controlling
Afghanistan. But this
will not sate the
generals; it will whet
their appetite.
Before the 9/11
attacks, they used
Taliban-controlled
Afghanistan as a
training ground for
anti-India jihadist
groups such as Lashkar-
e-Taiba. Afghanistan
also gave the ISI a way
to deflect responsibility
from itself for terrorist
attacks traced back to
territory controlled by
its protégés. Given the
Taliban’s close links
with groups like al
Qaeda and the LeT,
only the willfully naive
would take at face
value assurances by the
jihadist group that they
won’t allow Afghan
territory to be used to
target other countries.
The symbolic
significance of an army
of zealots humbling the
world’s sole
superpower is hard to
exaggerate. In the
Pakistani army it will
strengthen the hand of
those who view
Afghanistan not merely
in geopolitical terms,
but as the fulfillment of
a religious project
rooted in an extreme
interpretation of Islam
that shuns all Western
influence.
The same holds true in
Pakistani society at
large. If music-hating,
anti-Western, anti-
Shiite misogynists can
seize power in Kabul,
why can’t they do the
same in Islamabad? At
least one homegrown
Pakistani jihadist group,
the Tehreek-e-Taliban,
is comprised of fighters
already at odds with the
Pakistani government.
In a phone interview
from Islamabad,
Afrasiab Khattak, a
former Pakistani
senator and Pashtun-
rights activist, points
out that Pakistan
houses some 36,000
madrassas, or religious
seminaries, some of
which are militant. “The
same places producing
the Taliban are
producing similar
people in Pakistan,” he
says. “They will contest
for power in Pakistan
too.”
In early 2009, when
Afghan President Hamid
Karzai pressed Vice
President-elect Joe
Biden to crack down on
Taliban safe havens
across the border, Mr.
Biden reportedly
rebuffed him by
pointing out that
“Pakistan is 50 times
more important than
Afghanistan for the
United States.” As
president, Mr. Biden
may have ensured that
Pakistan is 50 times
more dangerous to the
U.S. and the world as
well.
______________________ _________ _________ ____________ _____
Author: Sadanand Dhume
Source: WSJ.com (Aug 19)
Image: Lahore - World Atlas
Email: IndiaWiki2020@gmail.com Website: http://TheGoodWord.IndiaWiki.Org
Since Kabul fell to the
Taliban Sunday, critics
have flayed President
Biden for diminishing
America’s global
standing, empowering
the Taliban and their al
Qaeda partners, cold-
shouldering U.S. allies,
and abandoning
Afghans who risked
their lives to work with
Americans. Add one
more likely
consequence of the
cack-handed U.S.
withdrawal: an
emboldened Pakistan,
whose Taliban-friendly
generals and plethora
of jihadist groups feel
the wind in their sails.
In official statements,
Pakistan says it backs a
peaceful resolution in
Afghanistan. But if
there is one global
capital where the
Taliban victory was
greeted with barely
disguised glee, it was in
Islamabad. On Monday,
Prime Minister Imran
Khan praised Afghans
for “breaking the
shackles of slavery.” On
social media, retired
generals and other
Taliban boosters hailed
the triumph of Islam,
never mind that the
defeated Afghan
government too called
itself an Islamic
republic.
Exultant Pakistanis
shared a video clip from
2014 featuring Hamid
Gul, a former head of
the army’s spy agency,
Inter-Services
Intelligence. “When
history is written, it will
be stated that the ISI
defeated the Soviet
Union in Afghanistan
with the help of
All this is determined by
Karma, work. No one
can get anything unless
he earns it. This is an
eternal law. We may
sometimes think it is
not so, but in the long
run we become
convinced of it. A man
may struggle all his life
for riches; he may cheat
thousands, but he finds
at last that he did not
deserve to become rich,
and his life becomes a
trouble and a nuisance
to him. We may go on
accumulating things for
our physical enjoyment,
but only what we earn
is really ours. A fool
may buy all the books in
the world, and they will
be in his library; but he
will be able to read only
those that he deserves
to; and this deserving is
produced by Karma.
Our Karma determines
what we deserve and
what we can assimilate.
We are responsible for
what we are; and
whatever we wish
ourselves to be, we
have the power to make
ourselves. If what we
are now has been the
result of our own past
actions, it certainly
follows that whatever
we wish to be in future
can be produced by our
present actions; so we
have to know how to
act. You will say, “What
is the use of learning
how to work? Everyone
works in some way or
other in this world.” But
there is such a thing as
frittering away our
energies. With regard
to Karma-Yoga, the Gita
says that it is doing
work with cleverness
and as a science; by
knowing how to work,
one can obtain the
greatest results. You
must remember that all
work is simply to bring
out the power of the
mind which is already
there, to wake up the
soul. The power is
inside every man, so is
knowing; the different
works are like blows to
bring them out, to
cause these giants to
wake up.
Swami Vivekananda
Karma Yoga
a series of extracts
Swami Vivekananda Image courtesy Newsgram.com;
From Pg 1
Last week Saleh
announced, 'under no
circumstances bow to
the Taliban terrorists. I
will never betray the
soul and legacy of my
hero Ahmad Shah
Massoud, the
commander, the legend
and the guide.’
Ahmad Shah Massoud
known as the ‘Lion of
Panjshir’ had organized
the Northern Resistance
that had fought the
Soviet Union and then
the Taliban in the
1990’s. He is the father
of Ahmad Massoud who
now helms the NRF.
Aug 20, NRF fighters had
won back control of the
Andrab district, Puli
Hisar and Dih-Salah
districts north of
Panjshir. Reports
claimed between 300
and 350 Taliban fighters
were killed in the attack.
On Aug 23, the Taliban
claimed they had
regained control of the
three districts and that
its fighters had set up
base in Badakhshan,
Takhar and Andarab
near the Panjshir valley.
Given Panjshir valley
does not flank an
international border
supplies to the region
have to be flown once it
is besieged by an
inimical Taliban. Ahmad
Massoud announced
they have sufficient
forces to mount an
effective resistance but
urged the Western
nations to supply arms
and ammunitions. Talks
between Massoud and
the Taliban failed earlier
on Sunday.
A clash appears
imminent.
An undependable ally
The US entered
Afghanistan in 2001 to
eliminate terrorists and
build a democratic rule
based country. Its
departure and
unwillingness to change
tac to defend a rapidly
imploding country have
raised questions about
its dependability as an
ally.
The US has blamed
rampant corruption in
the Afghan government
as a key reason for the
rapid collapse of a
300,000 strong Afghan
National Army before
75,000 Taliban fighters.
Even so, NATO countries
We found
ourselves in an
incredibly bizarre
situation, where
you are paying the
country that
created your
enemy so that it
will let you keep
fighting that enemy
cannot be absolved of
the charge of not
stemming the rot in two
decades. Their
complicity in corruption
seems likely. The world
must take note of how
corruption insidiously
consumed an entire
nation; and so quickly.
The other bizarre twist
in the partnership came
when the US and
Taliban negotiators
arrived at an agreement
on how American
troops would withdraw
and the Taliban would
provide
counterterrorism
assurances. The
Afghanistan
government was
excluded from the
process.
Despite these failings,
the US must act to
restore democracy in
Afghanistan.
India’s response
India must also use its
position as president of
the UNSC to build
consensus amongst
countries and ask for a
rule based democratic
government in
Afghanistan. The
international
community must
consider strengthening
the hand of the
resistance and to press
on the Taliban for a
democracy.
UN recognition of a
fanatical regime that
destroyed Afghanistan’s
flawed yet functioning
democracy with guns
and bloodshed will cede
all moral ground to
protest violations in
future even the Uighur
camps or the
Tiananmen shootout.
NATO countries will
meet later today to
discuss this topic as the
world watches.
Wikipedia, Twitter 1-2, Republic,
TimesNow, MSNBC, IndiaToday
Resistance pitted for a
fight against the Taliban